The treasure of «die alte Frau»

Berlin in UEFA Champions League. What a nice story it would be! But
you'd better throw your rose-colored glasses to the Spandauer channel on
your way from Berlin Tegel airport. Hertha BSC didn’t deserve direct
qualification to the group stage. Even their chances to finish fourth
are in danger too: Hertha BSC spent a almost two whole months without a
single win.

In the end of the day Hertha BSC haven’t kept fourth
place. It's like an unstable chaffinch perch and huge advance for them,
even though they still have bragging rights. Maximilian Mittelstädt, 19
year old talent from their youth academy played the whole match against
Bayern Munich as a right fullback. It was not a spectacular performance,
but he took charge and dealt with it showing no fear toward Thomas
Muller and Douglas Costa. Berlin-born Mittelstädt can be sure his
professional career didn't begin to find its dead end in the
Regionalliga Nord-Ost where the reserve team Hertha BSC II currently
plays. A minute against Eintracht Frankfurt is not one and only chance
for him to cut a newspaper article and set it under a frame or, even
worse, make a screenshot for his desktop.

During two days between
the German Cup semifinal against BVB 09 and the Bundesliga game against
Bayern Munich the managers and coaches of Hertha BSC youth academy were
visiting Saint Petersburg. Max Mittelstädt appearance was a great
argument for the Russian coaches who attended the lectures. Their German
colleagues were not wasting their breath.

In Berlin, you don't
feel the history like in Rome or Athens where you know for sure how old
is this stone or this little pillar near the bins in the park. In
Berlin, you feel the presence of the history like it was here a moment
ago. Those who have been to Berlin 30 years ago struggle to recognize
the city now when they go out of the subway to the Potsdamer Platz where
the Wall used to stand. Berlin is like old cheeky fellow who got second
wind and right now is having fun, taking care of himself and trying to
forget the past sorrows. Poor Warsaw is destined to find itself rather
like Frida Kahlo and it would be difficult for the Poland's capital to
keep up with Berlin.

In the late 80's Hertha
BSC had to play home games at the small Sport Park stadium due to the
low attendance. West Berlin was squeezed in all senses and suffered from
apathy. The fall of the Berlin Wall allowed the city to turn to the
most interactive outdoor museum, but it was also great news for Hertha
BSC. Not only the East part of Berlin but the whole federal state of
Brandenburg came into its possession.

'The Old Lady' (or die alte
Frau as German say for Hertha BSC) contains now 36,000 'Mitglieders'
(members) and 306 fan clubs around the world. There is also good
background for the creation of the strongest youth academy in the East
Germany, a region which hasn't yet recovered from the 20th century
affairs. By and large, right now, 25 years after the resumption of
active life, Hertha BSC is collecting the best young talents in the
region. However Benjamin Weber, the head of Hertha BSC football academy
with whom we met in St Petersburg insists that in his organization
nobody lives in cloud-cuckoo land.

"The most prolific producers of
talent in Berlin are Hertha BSC, Union and TeBe. The list can also be
completed by Hertha 03 Zehlendorf and Victoria. I don't like the words
'rivalry' or 'contest', because all these clubs together are creating
good conditions for the players to grow up competing at good level", he
says.

'Das Reboot' (the reform) which saved German football in the
early 2000's was profitable for Hertha BSC. The Old Lady played
regularly in Bundesliga and represented Berlin at the high level.
Furthermore, the situation in region is benevolent for Hertha BSC in
comparison with the regions like Nordrhein Westfallen or Ruhr where
plenty of clubs hustle and bustle for every young talent. The Old Lady
enjoys the possibility to skim the cream off the youth development
centers located in Berlin and Brandenburg. In any case, we remind you
that the result of the reform was the emergence of 366 such centers
across the country.

The demand for the football classes forced the
club to think about the coaching staff. In 2007 DFB set a special
certification system for the coaches to ensure that every future pro
would be taught by quality specialist, not angry gym teacher with a
whistle. This idea was as good for the club development as a previous
innovation. Several charismatic leaders who played for Hertha BSC in
Champions League 16 years ago got the opportunity to stay in the club
system instead of earning money only as TV pundits. So, U-15 team is now
led by Andreas Zecke Neuendorf, U-17, by Michael Hartmann, U-19, by one
of the best East Germany strikers Andreas Thom. You know Michael
Preetz, the club sports director as your neighbor, otherwise you
wouldn't reach these lines.

"They all give us
a very strong advantage. They know the structure and the philosophy of
the club, furthermore their hearts are blue and white, like Hertha BSC
heart," says Benjamin Weber.

In the early 2000's Hertha BSC youth
teams frequently won A- and B-Junioren-Bundesliga, but it has become
difficult to succeed with the appearance of powerful structures like VfL
Wolfsburg and especially RB Leipzig which seem to be going to collect
all the young talents around the country by all means.

"It is
great to have such competition," Weber speaks politically correct
language. "Our kids have a great possibility to compete at good level
from a very young age. No matter what RB Leipzig or VfL Wolfsburg do. We
focus on our region, Berlin-Brandenburg. We have to recruit best kids
at the right time, educate them, show them the way to the professional
football, although we don't have so much money. The coaching system is
the same. The main team coach is Pal Dardai who previously worked with
youth teams. It means that we created our proper correct philosophy and
we don't give up at the competitive level."

Indeed, they don't.
Hertha BSC youth teams stand in both 'small' Bundesligas tables near the
big companies 'kids' and defend the honour of the 'traditional' clubs.
The Berliners alongside with Schalke 04 and TSV 1860 München produced
the biggest quantity of the professional players for German football. On
the other hand, one of the Russian coaches was pretty right shaking his
head and grumbling: "Nothing's new, only old stuff" as he watched
Michael Hartmann taking the lead of the FC Dynamo St Petersburg youth
team at the Moskovsky stadium.

The basic principle of admission to
Hertha BSC youth academy is a Dutch litmus abstractly entitled 'love
for football'. There are neither tactics, nor physical exercises for the
kids until they are 13. The sense of competition Benjamin Weber is
speaking about is much more important. The U-10 teams inevitably play
against U-11, those ones, in their turn, against U-12. What is reason
for the seniors to play against juniors, Hertha BSC youth academy
managers were asked during the seminar. One day this seniors will play
against other seniors, was the answer. And this difference should be
even more obvious.

According to
Weber, Hertha BSC Academy is to set three directions to the personality:
school, football, and self-improvement. Don't be surprised, the ball
handling is not on the first place. Football Academy is also a social
project created with no purpose to graduate dummies from jokes. Even
with an elaborated educational process only one or two players in a year
become professional. The rest need to find themselves in other
professional areas and should be ready for this search. Weber refers to
specialists who derived a formula: if the kid is making magic tricks
with a ball, but is learning bad, then, sooner or later, his football
progress will stop too. Perhaps this is delusion typical for parents who
use to wag fingers at their kids: "If you don't eat porridge, you will
not go to play." But in fact it is pardonable, because Hertha BSC, as
well as any other club with the same approach, is responsible to the
country for many children (the selection over the whole land of
Berlin-Brandenburg takes place every Wednesday, plus holidays), who will
live in it and will do something for it. What would they do, pick up
cigarette butts, work in a store, or save lives? They will make a choice
themselves, with the help of a 'compass' they get at the academy.

Does
it all mean that there will be no more stars like Mario Basler who used
to smoke in the changing room or Stefan Effenberg with his famous
'middle finger salute'?

"Of course time has changed," Weber
agrees. "I guess it's good for football and for society. Educating young
generation like this we give clear example of how should professional
footballer look like. On the pitch they progress on their technical
skills and tempo, and that's the model of a modern player. Nevertheless,
I don't think our system prevents the emergence of new charismatic
characters."

You can establish any
philosophy you like. You can introduce a very high grade of certifying
the coaches for all ages. You can build modern Academy with nine natural
grass and two artificial pitches overlooking the block of the
Olympistadion where the main team players enter the field by the sound
of 'Nur nach Hause'. But all this efforts can produce only Potemkin
village effect. The main thing is mentality.

"Actually, it all
depends on the character and the will of the guys," one of the Hertha
BSC coaches considers. "They always want to win, to play, to fight. It
does make our work easier."

"We give the children the opportunity
to see the home games of our main team, to feel the atmosphere of our
big stadium, which is great regardless of whether we won or not. When
you become a professional, when you play three games a week, you don't
have time to watch the game," Weber seasons the motivation process with
an emotional ingredient.

It's impossible to play
football without passion. For the Czech coach Vlastimil Petrzela it was
the key to 'discover America' in St Petersburg as he took charge at
half-frozen FC Zenit team in 2003. Michael Hartmann and Tobias Jung not
only proved that during the training sessions with FC Dynamo St.
Petersburg youth team. They could act illusionists, because in front of
three dozen spectators they seemed to revive the mummy of the priest
Pa-di-ist from the Hermitage.

As the warm-up begun FC Dynamo
youngsters were anxious. They seemed to expect to be vivisected by the
foreigners. Meanwhile co-trainer Tobias Jung kept calm indicating errors
and pushing the tempo. So the players went on moving, concentrated, the
muscle memory started working and soon they had the momentum expected
by the coaches. It seemed like the statues of sphinxes (there are dozen
of them in Saint Petersburg) came alive.

The warm-up was not
useless as the black snowy cloud came from the center of St. Petersburg.
But Hartmann who had been waiting the team to start ball movement
drills seemed to consider himself protected with an invisible umbrella. A
man who played 240 matches for Hertha BSC and 2 for Germany national
football team has a right to think so staying at the pitch of Moskovsky
stadium.

Hartmann kept on smiling like Mona Lisa,
even when it became clear that the interpreter-girl couldn't keep up the
pace of the training and was not as good in football terms despite the
excellent knowledge of German. No shudder crossed Hartmann's face. The
coach continued giving orders in German and didn't care about
understanding.

A day before Tobias Jung was asked about the key
elements of football education in Hertha BSC Academy. "First touch and
receiving the ball," he replied. "Dribbling, control, the choice of the
direction of the ball movement." All of this was shown on the pitch. You
should have seen Hartmann reaching his goal, despite the fact that many
players heard German for the first time in their lives. "He is to get
mad," the audience whispered. And they were wrong about the coach. There
was no irritation in his voice or gesture. He interrupted the passing
if something got wrong, and explained with patience:

"If it is
hard to receive the ball you should make 2 or 3 touches. You shouldn't
pass the ball with one touch if your team-mate is not ready. When
receiving the ball you should move your shoulders according to the
direction of your pass. In this case almost all the pitch would be
visible."

It took about 5 minutes to make players start moving
their shoulders. Now it is clear that the pace in European is faster
than Russian, but running is not a key factor.

"Don't hurry up! Take the right position on the pitch! Leave as few dead zones as possible."

Sometimes
Hartmann was giving barely visible smile, but he never bothered to say
"No, no, no" or "Stop it, stop it". And as the training session went on
the footballers didn't look like guinea pigs no more. It turned out that
one of them moved really fast, for someone it was easy to change the
pace while the other one made no mistakes in passing. One training
session is enough to see the future professional footballer in almost
every young player. Everything else are journalistic clichés and
witticism. Everything else does not matter.

As the wet snow began sticking to the eyelashes Hartmann surrendered.

"Thank you all for today. I hope you will never play in such conditions."

Despite
the little natural disaster even the sceptics were sorry that the
training session was over. Even more complicated things than football
are powerless when it comes to excitement.

Alongside
with Max Mittelstädt and Florian Kohls introduced thoroughly by Pal
Dardai into the first team squad, tall central defender John Brooks
which is also Hertha BSC Academy product plays regularly this season.
And that's all.

"Of course we wish 11 Berlin-born players would be
in Hertha BSC starting lineup, but it is not realistic. Nico Schulz
played in all our youth teams, level by level, and eventually we were
able to make our own product bring income as Borussia Mönchengladbach
bought him. It means that the system is functioning," Weber insists.

Perhaps
the greatest proof of the system functioning is Jerome Boateng without
whom Joachim Low wouldn't go to the UEFA Euro 2016 in excitement.
Unfortunately it was not a big deal (in literal sense) for Hertha BSC.
Hamburger SV were wise to sign Boateng for €1.1 Mio and then sell him to
Manchester City for €12.5 Mio.

"No one doubted that Boateng will
be a great professional, because his skills were notorious at an early
age. In general, he was one of the fastest players we've ever tested in
the preview," Weber says.

Nor Boateng
doubted in his future refusing to sign 5-year contract deal offered by
Hertha BSC. The Berliners then were at the middle of the table, casting
fearful glances at the relegation zone.

It is not impossible for
Hertha BSC to get into such a trouble again. It is obvious that they
can't fight for the Champions League qualification every year. A hard
competition existing in Bundesliga for all the teams from the second
place to the 18th broke and goes on breaking plans of even more
ambitious clubs. That's why all the players who look brilliant this
season (Mitchell Weiser and Vladimir Darida, I guess) could leave Berlin
in case they get a good offer. But as long as the club is protected by
the youth Academy 'airbag' the reality doesn't look so scary. Only one
day in week is fixed for an official meeting with the Academy
representatives, but actually Michael Preetz and Pal Dardai meet with
them every day. They want to know whom the main team can count on in the
next future. Both Dardai and Preetz support the idea of giving young
players the opportunity to show their abilities every day. If it is
usual in the academies to take care of the education of young German
citizens then the clubs are obliged to solve the national team problems
with the weak positions in the different age categories.

"We have
some people for the right flank of the defense, but there is lack of
players on the left side," Benjamin Weber admits. "In the midfield, we
have some players with good abilities, in the attack, another lack. True
goalscorers do not appear every day, unfortunately. It's great that in
the main team they count on left-footed Mittelstädt, but we should take a
look at youth teams. Is there someone following his footsteps right
now? For example, to find left fullback now we look whether there is
such a central defender that would have not been too high, had good
speed and at the same time would have been left-footed to play on the
left side. This is a normal process for the youth system of the club.
What if a guy doesn't want to change the position? Eventually the desire
to continue professional career is stronger than momentary preferences.
Mitchell-Elijah Weiser who started his career as a winger and this
season agreed to substitute Peter Pekarik as a right fullback in the
main team can be used as a good example. It is possible that Weiser
would be eligible for the national team in his new capacity.

It
would be right to consider Weiser the product of FC Köln academy, but
the Hertha BSC idea is to bring up players not only for the club itself
but for all the German football. This example makes Hertha BSC idea even
more realistic.